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THE EDICT OF LEGEND 



AN ORATION 



ON THE LIFE AND SERVICES OF 



GrENERAL (jRANT, 



ROBERT LAIRD COLLIER, D. D. 



DELIVERED AT 



M^NH^TT^N^ BE^CH, 



SUNDAY, AUGUST 9th, 1885. 




D B^i^ THE 

ARRANGEMENTS. 



\ o 




THE EDICT OF LEGEND. ' 



The endeavor to set forth in fitting words the illustrious career just 
closed, and to estimate the character of the brave cajatain whose death is 
our common sorrow and the occasion of a nation's mourning, is not only 
a melancholy duty, but it is an impossible service. 

The outline of Gen. Grant's life, the dates of birth and battles, his 
civic administrations, traveling as in a triumphal car, saluted of all men 
the earth around, the solemn struggle for life till no courage and 
patience, however colossal, could longer hold at bay the enemy that in 
the end conquers all — this outline of days and deeds is already vividly 
in the mind and weirdly in the heart of every citizen and friend of 
America. 

No words can quicken the impression this man has made upon his 
nation and his generation. It is not for such inspiration that we are 
called together. It is only wished that our discourse, however full of 
sympathy, appreciation and eulogy, may not, in contrast with the people's 
profound sense of bereavement, seem altogether inadequate and depressing. 
When we would gaze upon the fire of life in eye and upon lip and radi- 
ant upon every feature, even the most truthful representation in statu- 
ary is only so much marble, and the disappointment leaves the heart 
with an ebbing away of hope and in a flood of despondency. 

April 27, 1822, was the day of welcome; July 23, 1885 was the day of 
adieu. What contrast of outward condition between the birth and 
the death! Ulysses S. Grant was born to the lot of the lowly, he grew 
to the lot of the great, and, dying, he has left a sheen of fame upon the 
river of time as imperishable as the records of memory. It is the felicity 
of the memory that it retains the best. While, therefore, men shall 
prize the virtues of sacrifice, courage and patriotism, and shall honor 
the most undaunted military genius of any age, the name of Ulysses S. 
Grant will be held in everlasting remembrance. There is a wisdom 
in the universe which ordains events, and which raises up its own 
agents to bring them about. There is not always an economy in 
the dispensations of nature obvious to the sight of men, for men 
are without prevision. But men look back upon these events years 
or ages after they have come to ppss, and bow down in reverence before 
the beneficence which prept-rea vhe man for each seeming exigency. 
And thus the peril to nations becomes the stepping stone to the world's 
advancing civilization. The working of this law in society is as silent 
as falls the snow^ or as shines the sun. Such an instance is that of the 
training of Grant for the hour of his country's need. Who shall save us 
and bring us forth again into union, and loyalty, and peace ? He must 



be a man brave and self-reliant, self-forgetting and sedate of mind. He 
must have sight — insight and foresight. He must have faith and believe 
unto the end. Ho must have a head that success will not turn; a modesty 
that achievements will not beguile. He must issue orders to "push 
things," and he himself must "fight it out on this line if it takes aU 
summer," He must magnanimously demand "an unconditional and 
immediate surrender." Where can such a man be found ? 

The boy is born at Point Pleasant, in the State of Ohio. His an- 
cestors were Scotch, and, like them, he can dare as he can endure. His 
circumstances are humble. He is born in a cabin; it is best he should 
be. The training in luxury lies in different fields. He must go where 
privation and hardships are to be found. But he is just-minded, calm- 
hearted, of clean hands, and sober manners. The prophecy of greatness 
is nowhere to be found in all his boyhood, but character, manly and 
moral, is already there, and this is his credential. It is this — his pure 
intent and stern integrity — his character, which has given him to us all 
to save us from national defeat, disgrace and despair. And so he was 
called to West Point, During four years, from 1839 to 1843, he held on 
his steady way and grew from boyhood to manhood, abiding by the 
discipline of the military academy, which upon his strong character was 
no strain, but which was as natural to him as the use of wings to a 
bird, or of fins to a fish. When character is born to command, it is 
wise enough to obey. Obedience is only irksome to weak natures. 
He ranked 21st in a class of 39, and upon quitting West Point was 
made a brevet 2d lieutenant in the 4th regiment, which was stationed 
on the Missouri frontier. 

During the summer of 1845 his regiment was ordered to Texas to 
join the army of Gen. Taylor, and in September Grant was commis- 
sioned as a full lieutenant. On May 8, 1846, he took part in his first 
battle, and saw blood shed at Palo Alto. He was thereafter upon every 
important field of the Mexican war. He was twice brevetted, and after 
the battle of Molino del Rey, September 8, 1847, he was appointed a 1st 
lieutenant for conspicuous bravery. In his report of the battle of 
Chepultepec, September 13, 1847, Col. Garland, commanding the 1st 
brigade, said : " The rear of the enemy had made a stand behind a 
breastwork, from which they were driven by detachments of the 2d 
artillery under Capt. Brooks and the 4th infantry under Lieut. Grant, 
supported by other regiments of the division, after a short but sharp 
conflict. I must not omit to call attention to Lieut. Grant, 4th infantry, 
who acquitted himself most nobly upon several occasions under my own 
observation." 

He was brevetted captain, his commission to date from the battle of 
Chepultepec. In 1848 he married Miss Julia Dent, a sister of one of 
his classmates. In 1852 he accompanied his regiment to California and 
Oregon, and August 5, 1853, was made a full captain. On the last day 
of July, 1S54, ho resigned his post in the army. And in doing so he did 



■MllWIMBMiBMTifiMl'lirini 



3 

not forsake the patli of duty, but followed it. He was a man of action, 
and his country, by which and for which he had been educated, had no 
need of his service. From 1854 to 1861 Grant lived the life of a 
plain man, with no vision of fame before his eyes. Genius has but 
one mark ; it is born to one duty — performing this, it becomes im- 
mortal. It is alike appropriate and opportune to dwell upon the 
career of our illustrious hero, for no man who ever lived more surely 
and steadfastly consecrated his genius to the cause set before him. He 
began in 1861 where he had left off in 1854. He stepped into his 
place, not as into one of opportvmity, but as into one of patriotism. 
He was walking a lowly path at Galena, and only walked another be- 
cause it was a duty. He began on the spot where he was to drill a com- 
pany of volunteers, and with them marched to the caj)ital of his State, 
and from thence he wrote to the Adjutant-General of the United States 
in these terms : " I tender my services in any capacity in which I can be 
of use. " He was retained at Springfield as an aide to the Governor of 
Hlinois, and acted as mustering officer until he was placed in command 
of the 2l8t regiment, his commission dating from June 17, 1861. On 
August 23 he was promoted to be a brigadier-general, and his commis- 
sion was dated back to May 17. True soldier that he was, he was soon 
in his saddle, and began to act. He seized Paducah . He commanded 
in person at Belmont, and had a horse shot under him. Fort Donelson 
is captured. Buckner, who commands the rebel forces, proposes a 
commission to arrange terms of capitulation, to which Grant replies : 
" No terms other than unconditional and immediate surrender can be 
accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works." This is 
inspiring; this is magnetic; this is prophetic; Grant is to the fore, and 
the war is begun. 

U. S. Grant is henceforth "Unconditional Surrender" Grant. In 
its fiction and in its fact this is synonymous with "United States" 
Grant. The blunder made in writing his name Ulysses S. Grant, instead 
of Hiram Ulysses Grant, when appointed a cadet at West Point, became 
an irrevocable military decree, and U. S. it shall be. The name is alike 
the same, and immortal, whether we read it as it is written in military 
annals or as written more imperishably in the hearts of his countrymen. 
Well nigh a year had passed amid alternating hope and disappoint- 
ment. The capture of Fort Donelson was the first substantial victory 
that crowned the Federal arms. Its hero sprang at once into national 
celebrity. He was thereupon commissioned major-general of volunteers, 
to date from February 16, the day of the fort's surrender. Patriotism 
mounts the ramparts of Donelson, and there are revealed to i^atriotism's 
present sight the splendid endowments, and to its future faith the mag- 
nificent achievements, of its hero. 

Although Halleck disapproved of Grant's plans for its capture, after 
the surrender of Vicksburg he said : " In boldness of plan, rapidity of 
exiscution and brilliancy of routes these operations will compare favor- 



ably with those of Napoleon about Ulm." The President watched with 
throbbing interest and jn'omiitest gratitude the alert actiA'ity and un- 
daunted valor of Grant and his army, and when whispers grew into 
clamor for Grant's removal, it was this man of destiny— candidate for 
the crown of martyrdom — who faltered not in his faith, but who said, 
out of the instinct of patriotism : "I rather like the man ; I think we 
will try him a little longer. " Vicksburg was the answer to Lincoln's 
faith, and ten days after its surrender he wrote to Grant, saying : 

" My Dear General : I do not remember that you and I ever met 
personally. I write this now as a grateful acknowledgment for the 
almost inestimable service you have done the country. I wish to say a 
word further. When you first reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, I 
thought you should do what you finally did— march the troops across 
the neck, run the batteries with the transports, and thus go below ; and 
I never had any faith, except a general hope, that you knew better 
than I that the Yazoo Pass expedition and the like could succeed. When 
you got below and took Port Gibson, Grand Gulf and vicinity, I 
thought you should go down the river and join Gen. Banks ; and when 
you turned northward, east of the Big Black, I feared it was a mistake. 
I now wish to make a j)ersonal acknowledgment that you were right and 
I was wrong." 

The rank of major-general in the regular army was now conferred 
upon the hero of Vicksburg. 

"On the 23d, 24th and the 25th of November, 1863, the battle of 
Chattanooga was fought, which included the famous struggles on Look- 
out Mountain and Missionary Ridge. Grant was personally under fire 
much of the time, and personally superintended every disposition of 
his troops. The result electrified the country, and more than inspired 
the army. No such battle had been fought west of the mountains. 
Grant led 60,000 men into action, and his lines were thirteen miles long. 
He captured more than 6,000 prisoners, about fifty pieces of artillery 
and 7,000 stand of small arms." 

Gen. Halleck, in his annual report, wrote : *' Considering the 
strength of the rebel position and the difficulty of storming his 
entrenchments, the battle of Chattanooga must be considered the most 
remarkable in history. Not only did the officers and men exhibit great 
skill and daring in their operations in the field, but the highest praise is 
due the commanding general for his admirable dispositions for dislodg- 
ing the enemy from a laosition almost imijregnable, " 

The first measure passed in the congressional session of 1863-4 was 
a resolution providing that a gold medal be struck for Gen. Grant, and 
returning thanks to him and his army. A bill reviving the grade of 
lieutenant-general was passed, and on March 1, 1864, the President 
signed the bill and nominated Grant for the post, which the Senate on 
the following day confirmed. 

On March 8 Grant arrived in Washington, and on the 9th he was 
formally jaresentod to the President, who addressed him with fervor and 
in these words: 

" Gen. Grant, the nation's appreciation of what you have done, and 
its reliance upon you for what remains to be done in the existing great 
struggle, are now presented with this commission constituting you 
Lieutenaiit-General in the Army of the United States. With this high 



5 

honor devolves upon you also a corresponding responsibility. As the 
country herein trusts you, so, under God, At will sustain you. I scarcely 
need to add that, with what I here speak for the nation, goes my own 
hearty personal concurrence." 

To this. Gen. Grant replied as follows: 

" Mr. President, I accept the commission, with gratitude for the high 
honor conferred. With the aid of the noble armies that have fought in 
so many fields for our common country, it will be my earnest endeavor 
not to disappoint your expectations. I feel the full weight of the re- 
sponsibility now devolving ui^on me; and I know if they are met, it will 
be due to those armies, and above all to the favor of that Providence 
which leads both nations and men." 

Before leaving Washington, Grant, with happy and beautiful thought- 
fulness, wrote to Gen. Sherman this soldierly letter: 

" While I have been eminently successful in this war, in at least 
gaining the confidence of the public, no one feels more than I how much 
of this success is due to the energy, skill and the harmonious putting 
forth of that energy and skill of those whom it has been my good for- 
tune to have occupying subordinate positions tinder me." 

In his letter of reply, Sherman used the following language: 

*' You are now Washington's legitimate successor, and occupy a posi- 
tion of almost dangerous elevation; but if you can continue, as hereto- 
fore, to be yourself, simple, honest and unpretending, you will enjoy 
through life the respect and love of friends and the homage of millions 
of human beings, who will award you a large share in securing to them 
and their descendants a government of law and stability. * * * I 
believe you are as brave, patriotic and just as the great prototype Wash- 
ington — as unselfish, kind-hearted and honest as a man should be — but 
the chief characteristic is the simple faith in success you have always 
manifested, which I can liken to nothing else than the faith a Christian 
has in the Saviour. Your reputation as a general is now far above that of 
any man living, and partisans will maneuver for your influence; but, 
if you can escape them, as you have hitherto done, you will be more 
powerful for good than it is possible to measure." 

The lieutenant-general now returns to Washington, and, with his head- 
quarters in the field, assumes command of all the national forces. With 
quite 700,000 men in the field, he plans the two gigantic campaigns with 
which the rebellion is brought to a close; the one under Gen. Meade, to 
operate against Richmond, defended by Lee; the other, under Gen. 
Sherman, against Atlanta, defended by Johnson. In April, 1865, Rich- 
mond was evacuated, and Grant forced the surrender of Lee's army on 
the 9th of that month. Johnson was unable to check the advance of 
Sherman, and Hood, his successor in command, lost his army before 
Nashville. 

Grant had conquered the peace for which he had foiight, and Lincoln 
was transfigured in the glory of a martyr's death. In military rank, 
Grant was now the peer of Washington and Scott. But July 25, 1866, 
he was commissioned the "general" of the army, the honor having been 
created for the man to whom the nation owed a debt of gratitude no 
human homage could ever pay. His splendid services in the field were 
to be remembered when no longer there were battles to be won. And 
he who had saved the nation by war was now the best equipped to heal 
the wounds which war had made. It were a mockery of the loftiest in- 
stincts of patriotism and gratitude to look elsewhere among men for one 
to sit in the seat of the martyred President. He who had borne the 
strife of battle and its expectancy of death was best fitted to cherish the 
blessing, and readiest to invoke the coming of peace. The first general 



6 

of America had been its first president, and its greatest general was to 
be its greatest president. 

But why traverse the events in the life of this man of solemn mien 
and silent lips ? That subtle force of will which is the conqueror first 
of self dominates all events and brings them to pass. For, after all, it 
was this — his character — which overcame difficulties which no tactics, 
no strategy, no prowess could have brooked and conquered. The esti- 
mate of Ulysses S. Grant which dates his greatness with the victory 
at Donelsou misses the golden thread of sequence. For there is the 
same life running through all his days as through all his deeds. The 
qualities which shone forth in such conspicuous splendor at Vicksburg 
and Chattanooga were no other than those which marked his conduct 
upon every field in Mexico. This same force was mighty and persistent 
through those desperate days of his last encounter with suffering and 
death. His character was greater than all victories, and more imperish- 
able than all renown. Before Grant was soldier or statesman he had 
the sense of justice, the sentiment of generosity, the singleness of aim, 
the industry of duty which made him a man. His crown of manhood, 
rather than "^ the sword of the soldier or the sceptre of the statesman, is 
the secret of his conquests and the pledge of his fame. His character 
was as transparent as the atmosphere. He was never less than himself. 
If his speech was restrained, it was never the reticence of concealment. 
If he had nothing to reveal, he had nothing to hide. He was silent 
when he had nothing to say. Manliness in a man is his charm and fas- 
cination. 

During Grant's first term of office as President he attended service 
in the church of which I was the minister in Chicago, when the sermon 
was treating of the unity of the race and the brotherly obligations 
of man as man. The President took occasion after the service to 
speak in commendation of the aim of the sermon, and, with beautiful 
simplicity, said, in the tersest sentence : ' ' Men are more scarce than 
heroes." 

At the house of a friend in Chicago I was sitting alone with him late 
into the night, when he closed a long and thoughtful discourse, which I 
seldom interrupted, by referring to the irresponsible way in which 
even friends would profi'er advice, and rising from his chair, he said: 
"I have never lacked for people to give me — advice." 

On Thanksgiving day, 1876, when the country was under no little 
strain of evil apprehension, I was in Washington, and sitting with the 
President in his private office. He asked me if the people thought 
there would be any trouble about the inauguration of the President- 
elect. In reply, I said that the people naturally looked to him, and 
asked what he would do should there be any lawlessness or outbreak. 
The President looked amused, and pleasantly answered: "I know what 
I would do, but I don't mean to tell. " 

It is probably true that no man of like renown with Gen. Grant has 
ever been so fully reported to the world. He kept copies of his dispatches, 
and memoranda of all important events in his military and civic career. 
He practically revised and edited the military history written by Gen. 
Badeau, and the account of his trij? round the world, written by Mr. 
John Russell Young. ; For a quarter of a century he has stood in the focus 
of a full flood of light. He was literally read and known of all men. 
With all this knowledge of Gen. Grant, it is not known that he ever 
wrote or spoke an unjust or ungenerous word of any human being. He 
was as magnanimous as he was manly. Vain minds have grievances. 
Grant was never conscious of one. In his passage at arms with President 
Johnson, he gave expression to the indignity that had been put upon him. 



On August 12, 1867, President Johnson removed Edwin M. Stanton 
from the office of Secretary of War, and Gen. Grant was appointed by 
the President Secretary of War ad interim. He performed the duties of 
Secretary of War until January 14, 1868. The Senate had refused to 
concur with the President in the removal of Stanton, and Grant quietly 
allowed him to resume his duties in the office from which he had been 
displaced. Grant was much displeased with his own treatment, as 
the following exract from his letter of February 3, to Johnson, will 
show : 

' ' I can but regard this whole matter from the beginning to the end 
as an attempt to involve me in a resistance of law, for which you hesitate 
to assume the responsibility in orders, and thus to destroy my character 
before the country. I am, in a measure, confirmed in this conclusion in 
your recent orders directing me to disobey orders from the Secretary of 
War, my superior and your subordinate, without having countermanded 
his authority to issue the orders I am to disobey. " 

In illustration of the charming generosity of his mind, his 
references to Gen. Halleck may be cited: "It was only after Donelson 
that I began to see how important was the work that Providence devolved 
upon me. And yet after Donelson I was in disgrace and under arrest, 
and practically without a command, because of some misunderstanding 
on the part of Halleck. It all came right in time. I never bore Halleck 
iU will on account of it, and we remained friendly. He was in command, 
and it was his duty to command as he pleased. But I hardly know what 
would have come of it, as far as I was concerned, had not the country 
interfered. The country saved me from Halleck's displeasure." 

After the battle of Donelson, he informed Gen. Buckner that he had 
no desire to humiliate his prisoners, but the officers might retain their 
side arms, and they and the men were left in possession of their personal 
baggage. Buckner presented Grant to his troops, and assured the Con- 
federate prisoners that Gen. Grant had been kind and magnanimous to 
them, and charged them to remember it. 

He was as magnanimous in the cabinet as he was upon the field. The 
spirit of his administration is embodied in these notable and noble words: 
" We will not deny to any of those who fought against us any privileges 
under the government which we claim for ourselves. On the contrary, 
we welcome all such who come forward in good faith to help build up 
the waste places, and to perpetuate our institutions against all enemies, 
as brothers in full interest with us in a common heritage ; but we are not 
prepared to apologize for the part we took in the war." 

In the portraiture of Gen. Grant it must be said that his manliness 
and his magnanimity were not more conspicuous than his modesty. His 
modesty was not the suppression of self-reference, suggested by social 
diplomacy. His character was moulded and developed upon lines of 
action so unselfish in their aim, and so comprehensive in their result, 
that a just estimate of himself left no place for vanity, which is the 
resource — and perhaj^s the last conscious resource — of small minds. 
Sometimes the effort to create in other people a just knowledge of our 
motives may have the ajjpearance of vanity, but Gen. Grant was free 
from even this somewhat pardonable foible. If ever the volume of 
fame were an apology for personal assumptions, it might have been in 
the case of this man already clothed in romance that hung about him 
like a glory. It was in this weedless soil that sprang up the religious 
habit of his mind and life. The men of supreme powers in all the his- 
tory of the race have been, not only reverent, but devout. History 
has an unbroken testimony to bear to the truth of this statement. 
Men whose vision does not include God with a distinctness that begets 



adoration and obedience are men whose limitations remand them to the 
lower ranks of intellectual and moral endowment. Gen, Grant's sense 
of moral distinctions was both sure and steadfast. He was gentle as 
sleeping infancy; as silent as the forces of nature; as strong as the 
battlements of rectitude. 

" No low born form is thine ; albeit thou com'st 
Wearing no ornaments." 

The written history of this man will never reach the truth. This 
must be left to the larger and subtler insight of legend. The truth is 
not wholly told when dates and details are chronicled. Indeed, facts 
seldom aid that impression which finally becomes reputation, and which 
is forever thereafter a man's place and rank in tradition. There is, 
therefore, a less and a larger history, the history of fact and the history 
of truth. When the outward history of genius has been written, 
romance so retouches its features as to give to cold data grace and 
charm, reality and life. 

General Grant was the definitive and determining factor in the most 
gigantic and most momentous war for the integrity and permanence of 
free and popular government known to the annals of mankind. And 
this he was by the nation's dire necessity. 

A republic is a form of government, not for war, but for peace. 
When the rights of all the people are at stake, war has the aspect of 
self-murder. Kings may wage war, for then only the subjects of the 
King may suffer. But when the sovereign people go to war, it is the 
sovereign people Avho must brave the dangers and reap the harvest of 
death, and perhaps of defeat and shame. Monarchies go to war for 
aggrandizement and conquest ; but not so reiaublics. It is not for the 
glory of a crown that a republic exists, but for the prosperity of a 
people. The people do not wage war ; they go to war to defend their 
rights and to preserve the peace. And patriotism knows no higher duty 
than this. The war which called General Grant from his humble home 
and lowly lot was no iiroject of territorial gi-eed, nor yet the hazard 
of a mistaken sentiment. 

Alexander and Napoleon drew the sword in contempt of human life. 
Washington and Grant drew the sword in defense of human life . It is 
to the unfading glory of themselves and the cause they served that they 
sheathed the sword when liberty was won. 

The instinct of the race has not, therefore, gone astray. The 
military hero is the most fascinating and the most romantic figure in 
history"! It is the spirit of his calling to lay down his life for his 
country. This is the ideal hero. Individually he may be misled. He 
may go fortli upon an errand of theft and murder. Notwithstanding the 
iniquity of war, he who inspii-es it, who successfully wages it, stands for 
the ideal of sacrifice. And in chieftain or in saint it is this virtue of 
sacrifice which the instinct of men holds in reverence. General Grant 
not only fought bravely, but he fought in a good cause ; he fought for 
hearthstone and altar ; for his country's life and for liberty. 

Washington and Lincoln have gone before, and have borne witness 
to the truth. They builded wisely, and their work shall not perish in 
the earth. Grant's renown shall not be less than theirs. The sedate- 
ness of his character, the solemnity of his conduct, the restraint of his 
speech, the fidelity of his attachments, the magnitude of his achieve- 
ments combine to lift his name to an altitude of sislendor which only 
legend can translate to the understanding of the centuries. Washing- 
ton, Lincoln, Grant ! It is the edict of legend that the greatest of these 
is Grant. 

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